A belated update

What with Christmas, buying my first house and general life, the pages of drink up ye cider have been a bit neglected (more than a bit, I last updated this in November, it’s now mid January ffs!) and it’s about time I got this sorted and updated the blog. 

The last game I wrote about for City was the cracking home draw against Sutton United, while I watched Bradford Town away at Trowbridge, come this weekend I was watching Bradford Town again while City were away at Basingstoke. 

Since the Sutton game, City’s fine form has continued, and the Romans are now flirting massively with the play offs, which given how at the end of October the stripes were down at the wrong end of the table, is a remarkable turn around in form.  

On Boxing Day, City beat Weston-super-Mare with Ross Stearn returning from suspension to haunt his old side, scoring from a diving header, to give City the win. As sure as night follows day, the return game on New Years Day was postponed, at least this year we didn’t have to get to Weston to find that out.  

On the 28th, in that awful post Christmas – Pre New Year lull, when you are running out of things to do, an away trip to Eastleigh arrived. There was a good contingent of stripes, a couple of group 4’s and 3’s from Bath, and then a plethora of Isle of Wight Romans met us at Southampton. A few (not completely welcomed) pints were sank in Southampton, before getting the train to Southampton Parkway, before a taxi to the Silverlake Stadium, reiterating my yearly lament at how crap the ground is and how inaccessible it is to anyone who doesn’t want to drive to a game.  

The stripes played very well against high spending, promotion chasing Eastleigh, and arguably should have got a draw or even nicked the points, Andy Watkins in particular had a few golden opportunities, and was denied what appeared nailed on penalty (see video), the loss of three points wasn’t the only penalty City were to suffer, as Dan Ball broke his collar bone and faces many weeks/months on the sidelines, a huge blow as Dan has been a superb performer since joining from Bristol City. 

Somehow, City contrived to draw at home to Staines Town, despite again having the better chances, the unfortunate Watkins hitting the woodwork twice from distance, a late Dave Pratt goal wasn’t enough to give City a win, as an even later, last gasp freekick was headed home, somewhat taking the gloss of what should have been a good day for the stripes.  

In off field matters, Chairperson, Manda Rigby stepped down, in circumstances that are still clouded in misinformation and intrigue. Not knowing the full details, I don’t want to comment myself, other than for some she was seen as the person responsible for all of City’s ills (she wasn’t) while to others she was the greatest thing ever (again she wasn’t) like much of life, the answer is probably more towards the middle, but she was replaced by Paul Williams, who everyone can agree is an all round good egg. 

Finally, with the stripes away at Basingstoke (a nil nil draw keeping City in 7th) I decided to go home to Bradford, to watch Bradford Town take on Corsham Town. Given how far ahead in the Western League Div 1 Bradford are, it was to be assumed that the game would be a home win.  

In what was a lovely, crisp, bright blue January day, the two teams played out a brilliant first half. Corsham took the lead, before being pegged back, before the Corsham right winger scored a beautiful goal, cutting inside off the flanks, taking on a few defenders before lashing a shot past the stranded Bradford keeper. Bradford then pulled it back to 2-2, before top goal scorer in all of English football Sam Jordan put the home side 3-2 up. 

The game was played out in front of a crowd of 119, and given that there were 3 more 100+ crowds across the Western Leagues, which lets remember are levels 9 & 10 of the English pyramid, shows how deep the love of football goes in this country still.  

With Bradford leading at half time, the assumption was that they would put their foot on the accelerator and score a few more. However, Corsham had been playing very well, and it was they who were to inflict the first league loss of the season, on the leaders. Corsham scored three second half goals, to win the game 3-5, and it is to be hoped that the result is a kick in the arse to Bradford to not get complacent, and not assume promotion is already sown up. 

City’s league fixtures continue with a home game against leaders Bromley, which will be a challenge for the men in black and white, and could go a long way to showing whether this flirting with the play offs can be sustained or not.